Related Applications
This application is related to the U.S. Pat. Application having Ser. No. 597,125 filed on April 5, 1984 now U.S. Pat. No. 4690072 by Herbert S. Wille, et al. and entitled "BOLSTER FOR A RAILWAY CAR".
Field of the Invention
This invention relates to railway cars, and more particularly to gondola railway cars having a frameless type radial truck.
Description of the Prior Art
The usual practice in a prior art has been to support gondola car bodies with a four-wheeled truck at each end of the car. The truck normally comprised a frame supporting two axles each having two wheels. A pin at approximately the center of the truck extended upwardly, and the gondola car body had a reinforced receiving opening therein which admitted the truck pivot pin for support of the car body on the truck. The structure of the car body was designed to transmit almost all of the vertical load of the car body's weight and the weight of the cargo to the truck at one particular point, i.e., the structure around the truck pivot pin. Recently, frameless radial trucks have been devised which do not have a frame restricting movement of the axles, but include a pair of axles with wheels thereon supporting four castings. Each casting supports a pair of resilient connection structures in the area of the wheels. The resilient structures supportingly engage the car body. The engagement results in vertical loads being transferred in different locations in the car body from those locations usual in the prior art. The older structures of gondola cars configured for use with frame trucks having a central pivot pin are ill equipped to support loads in these locations.